origin of "to cock a snook".....ehhhhhh, okay, I am not even sure I can define it, much less think about origin, except to say it is some sort of derisive or defiant gesture and I can at least give a pointer to a picture http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/10/31/article-0-15C72D5C000005DC-249_634x400.jpg, but I can't say much more to help...maybe fingers wave or are static....I don't know....term sounds British...maybe an American may say five-fingered salute, but I rarely see any name for it....I just see it being done...but I have no idea what a snook is...etc.

Perry Lassiter wrote:I just remember we did it a bunch in the fifties. Usually thumb on nose, four fingers waving. But I don't remember connecting it with the cock a snoot phrase before, though I had heard it.

I must ask, did you mean to write "snoot", or is it a typo?

Life is like playing chess with chessmen who each have thoughts and feelings and motives of their own.

I am interested in almost every Good Word and Good Word suggestion. But "to cock a snook" is entirely foreign to me and also holds absolutely none of my interest. So why am I bothering to post this? I really can't say.

Your contributions are all appreciated, thanks. But note that I put my request in the section "Good Word 'Suggestions'" rather than "Discussions", simply as an idea for Dr. Beard. So I guess it would not have mattered to me if anybody other than Dr. Beard had wanted to entertain it or not. But I thank you.

I think we have always commented on Good Word Suggestions. It gives us more fodder for our cannons. I am happy to entertain "to cock a snook" even though no one seems to know where it came from. I just don't plan to put it in my vocabulary of immediate recall. Due to my advanced age, that vocabulary has tended carefully so I won't always be at a loss for words.